


Purple Umbrellas and Petrichor

by CinderAsh



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Human, Fluff, M/M, Rain, analogical - Freeform, short fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-15
Updated: 2020-02-15
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:14:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,104
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22731574
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CinderAsh/pseuds/CinderAsh
Summary: Logan forgets his umbrella. Virgil offers to share.
Relationships: Anxiety | Virgil Sanders/Logic | Logan Sanders
Comments: 17
Kudos: 137





	Purple Umbrellas and Petrichor

**Author's Note:**

> Guess who's here with their latest obsession/ship!
> 
> ...It's me. Posting Analogical content. Expect more, because I would die for these children.

Logan glared at the sky, irrationally angry.

Well, not irrationally -- in fact, he felt quite justified. When he had left this morning, it had been bright out, the sun warm on Logan’s face as he walked across campus. He hadn’t even bothered to take his car, the day had been so nice. 

But now here he stood, at the entrance to the library, the rain making tiny rivers in the road. His backpack, containing his laptop and all the notes for his astrophysics thesis (plus an assortment of library books) was clutched to his chest. 

There was no way he could make it back to his dorm without damaging any of his belongings, and Logan needed the computer for tomorrow -- his professor had mentioned that they would be taking a writing assessment online.

He sighed, retreating back through the glass doors.

Normally, Logan loved the campus library. The smell of paper, the sounds of quiet rustling, typing, and hushed whispers, the window seat on the second floor which he’d lay claim to since he first came here… It was like a second home for him, especially since it was rather difficult to work in his dorm with his roommate, Roman, practicing for his theatre class. 

And, of course, there was one more reason why he liked the library so very much. 

“Hey, L,” waved Virgil from the circulation desk. “Didn’t expect to see you back so soon. Forget something?”

“I’m afraid not. It’s pouring outside, and I can’t risk water getting into my bag.” He sighed, leaning against the desk, bag on the floor beside him. Virgil winced in sympathy, looking up at Logan from his seat behind the computer. “I suppose I will have to stay here.”

“We’re closing soon, actually,” the librarian told him, not without sympathy. (“Assistant librarian,” Virgil would correct him, had Logan actually called him it out loud. “Can’t have a full-time job and classes, remember?”)

Logan remembered. He remembered just about everything Virgil told him -- how he was an English major, but took every art class he could because drawing helped with his anxiety. How he’d come from a tiny town that hadn’t taken his anxiety disorder well and had taken his sexuality worse. How he’d been forced to move to live with his uncle in Florida when he was fourteen because of how alarmingly toxic the rest of his family had become. How his parents had refused to pay for college, so he’d fought tooth and nail for any scholarship he could get and had to spend his free time working at the library or the Starbucks a few blocks away. 

They’d become fast friends, him and Virgil, especially after they’d figured out they lived in the same dorm and had two mutual classes. They would sometimes pair up for group assignments or study together, but usually, they spent time together like this; chatting as Virgil worked and Logan read or completed assignments for his classes. 

Was it any wonder, really, that Logan had developed a small crush on this boy with brown bangs covering his dark eyes and perpetual eyeshadow, who joked that he was emo and complained that he was short, who always was wearing something purple, even if it was as small as a friendship bracelet, and was far more intelligent than anyone gave him credit for? 

“Hey, I’ll be going home in a couple of minutes,” Virgil mused, snapping Logan out of his thoughts. “I have a pretty big umbrella. Want to share?”

“Are you sure?” he asked, even as his heart said yes, even as his brain insisted he accept. “I wouldn’t want to inconvenience you.”

“It’s no big deal,” Virgil replied. “We’re going to the same place, anyways. And Andrea said she’d lock up tonight, so I just have to shelve the rest of these returns and we can bounce.”

“Bounce?” Logan inquired. Virgil sighed in mock disappointment, pulling a flashcard off of a stack on his desk. 

“New term,” he said, writing bounce on one side. Logan had always been a little jealous of Virgil’s handwriting, which was far neater than his ever was. “Here, go look that up online while I finish up.”

Logan did, scribbling the definition on the opposite side and tucking it into his bag, before going off to find the emo librarian. 

“Want some help?” he asked when he found Virgil, who was shelving a copy of Dante’s Inferno. 

“Sure,” he replied, smiling at Logan, the little half-smile that never failed to cause what Roman called “Your heart fluttering!”, and which Logan called “Emotion-based heart palpitations.” “Thanks.”

“Of course,” he said, returning the smile. And when Virgil’s face reddened just a bit, he found himself turning to the shelves with his own cheeks pink. 

They were finished in no time at all, really, once Logan began to help, and soon they were outside, under the overhang above the entrance, Virgil opening his umbrella and Logan adjusting his bag. 

The umbrella was a bright magenta, covered in tiny cats and dogs. There was a pun in there somewhere, Logan knew. 

He raised an eyebrow, and Virgil sighed. “My friend Patton bought it for me,” he said, shoulders hunching as if he was trying to disappear into his sweatshirt. “I don’t want to make him feel bad, and it really is a good umbrella. Just… bright.”

“I think it’s cute,” Logan remarked. “And you shouldn’t feel ashamed of it -- I wouldn’t judge you for such a thing, anyway.”

His face flushed with a grateful smile, and Virgil straightened, motioning for Logan to join him under the colorful umbrella. He had been right about it being large enough for the two of them, luckily -- if they stood close together, both were well protected from the downpour. Still, Logan shifted his bag between them, just in case. 

They left the library, making their way through the streets. It was warm, even as it rained, but Logan still found himself standing a bit closer to Virgil than was necessary. The shorter male had to hold the umbrella higher than he might usually, to accommodate for Logan’s height, so he told himself he was making it easier by standing in the dome of the umbrella. 

(You just want to be close to him, pointed out the tiny part of Logan that wasn’t in denial of how bad this little ‘crush’ had gotten. The rest of his consciousness ignored it.)

“And it was a dark and stormy night,” Virgil remarked, the hood of his purple and black sweatshirt up and covering most of his brown hair. He grinned at Logan. “Sounds like we’re in a crappy horror movie.”

“Or a ridiculous romantic comedy,” he pointed out. Virgil bit his lip at that, something that Logan remembered was usually one of his tells for anxiety symptoms, but his face brightened as he spoke again.

“The start of an apocalypse -- like that Netflix series about the toxic rain?”

“The end of a spy movie?” Logan suggested. “Where the two main characters stand together in a rainy public setting, trying to appear casual?”

“If we were spies, we’d have a cooler umbrella,” Virgil laughed, and he found himself snickering too. 

“Maybe we’re not spies, then,” he shrugged. “Perhaps just two… disaster gays, I believe the term is, on a walk in the rain.”

“Mood,” his friend said in response. (Friend? asked Logan’s mind. Really?) “Good usage, too. Ten points for Logan!”

“I’ve always liked the smell of rain,” Logan remarked after a minute of comfortable silence. 

“There’s a word for that, actually,” Virgil said quietly, watching drops of water splash against the ground. “Petrichor? It’s derived from Greek -- the word petros, stone, or petra, rock, and ichor, which is the blood of the gods. I like to think of it as kind of a… lifeblood, you know? My professor thinks it might be more literal, though, a blood of the earth because of the rain. Which would also make sense, because the Greek earth goddess (although she was really more of a Titan), Gaia, she hated Zeus for usurping her children. Even though she’d helped him to do it, so double standards much? Anyways, it may have been a metaphor for her hatred of him, because Zeus was associated with lightning and storms, making petrichor a word to describe Gaia’s pain at Zeus’ rule.

“But I like the thought of it being more the smell of new blood, almost, of a kind of holiness in growing things, in new life from the rain. The scent of life being born.”

He cut himself off from his tangent, looking at Logan almost fearfully, biting his lip. After a beat, he realized he had been staring intently at Virgil as he talked. Most people just didn’t know as much as Logan. It wasn’t a judgment on his part, or conceit -- he simply knew more. He had always been the smartest person in the room. But Virgil? 

He was so, so intelligent, even though he hid it behind snark and eyeshadow and a strange love for conspiracy theories. Smarter than Logan himself, maybe, but it was hard to tell because Virgil didn’t acknowledge it. He was quiet, this emo male that Logan liked so much, but when he was passionate about something he revealed a depth of knowledge that made Logan’s seem small in comparison. It was… refreshing, because standing there, under that umbrella, hiding from the sheets of rain, he didn’t feel nearly as alone as he usually did. 

(Looking back, years and years later, Logan would think maybe this was the moment he knew he loved Virgil. No, not ‘knew’, really, not in the truest sense of the word, but the moment his subconscious understood how much he truly cared for the male beside him. Virgil would joke that Logan had only loved him for his brains. But that wasn’t it, exactly -- it was more the feeling of equality he loved, of someone just as intelligent as him beside him, someone who matched Logan perfectly, like a puzzle finding a missing piece.)

“I prefer your theory,” he said after a beat. “It isn’t as… confined as your professor’s, if that makes sense. Also, it’s much more inclusive to those who weren’t religious Ancient Greeks, and considering their belief system died out hundreds of years ago, probably ideal.”

Virgil laughed at that, relaxing, and Logan’s heart swelled. 

Their walk was peaceful, really, and after that first initial bump in conversation, they were more comfortable, in a way the two had never been speaking to each other before. It was too soon, them reaching the dorms. He didn’t want this moment to end. 

They stopped outside of Logan’s dorm room, standing awkwardly in the doorway. He cleared his throat. “Virgil,” he began, with a sudden boldness, “what are you doing on Saturday?”

“Nothing, really. Just a class in the morning,” he replied, fidgetting with his long sleeves. “Um, why?”

“Well…” Logan said, and his momentary courage nearly fled him. He grasped it with both hands, and held it fast, because he knew that if he didn’t do it now, he never would again. “I rather like you, in a not entirely platonic sense. And if it is acceptable to you, I would like for us to… maybe get lunch together.”

“Like -- like a date?” Virgil asked, eyes peering up at him through dark bangs, a kind of hopeful nervousness within them.

“Yes. Like a date,” Logan nodded. 

“I would like that too,” he smiled, a shy sort of smile Logan hadn’t ever seen on him before, not from Virgil of the sarcastic wit and blatant pessimism. He found he enjoyed it. “I’d… I’d really like that.” 

“I’ll text you, then?” he suggested, beaming too.

“That would be great,” Virgil agreed, and, waving, walked away down the hall, the still-soaked, bright purple umbrella in his hand. 

Logan opened the door to his room fully, unable to wipe the delight from his face. 

Roman was standing there, eyes alight. “Did you just score a date?” he asked, grinning. 

“I suppose I did,” he nodded, taking off his sodden shoes and falling back onto his bed, lips curled upwards as he stared giddily at the ceiling.

In the distant future, when Logan was curled up on the couch with Virgil, wrapped in a blanket and listening to the rain outside, he would spot the garish umbrella in the hall. He would smell the breeze wafting in through the windows they had left open a crack. And he would remember that day it rained, of Logan and Virgil, of purple umbrellas and petrichor.

**Author's Note:**

> Come find me on Tumblr! (Or don't, that's entirely your choice and I don't want you guys to feel pressured to.)
> 
> https://www.tumblr.com/blog/awkwardthings6


End file.
